Biography

Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur comte de Rochambeau was Marshall to France. He was a French general who supported the American Revolution. He commanded French forces that helped to defeat the British at Yorktown in 1781. Initially he was trained for the church, but he decided instead to enter a cavalry regiment. He then fought in the War of Austrian Succession, leading to his promotion to colonel. In 1761 he was promoted to brigadier general and inspector of cavalry and was later appointed governor of Villefranche-en-Roussillon in 1776. In 1780 he was put in command of a 6,000 troop French army which was sent to America to help in the Revolutionary War against Britain.  They arrived in Newport, Rhode Island in July 1780 and waited for French naval support. They waited a year for its arrival before joining forces with General George Washington in June 1781 in White Plains, NY. They descended to Yorktown and with the Marquis de Lafayette and his American forces and the French naval forces under Admiral de Grasse they laid siege to Cornwallis and forced his surrender on October 19, 1781. He remained in Virginia for a year, leaving for Europe in January 1783. King Louis XVI appointed him commander of Calais and, later, Alsace for his contribution to the peace. In the French Revolution, from 1790-1791, he commanded the Army of the North and was given the title marshal of France in 1791. He was then arrested during the Reign of Terror, but he managed to avoid being guillotined. He was pensioned by Napoleon once he came to power.